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An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

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Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#181

Post by pharmakom »

conductr wrote: post #112
keyboard_slap wrote: post #98

What problem is this system trying to solve? It seems to be, in this initial deployment, that the office park is too far away from the restaurants its employees want to visit, compelling them to drive there. I feel like a better solution would be permitting denser and mixed-use development, so employees can walk to their favorite restaurants on the ground floor instead of driving >1km to them or paying for a delivery…

I feel like comments like this always come up. Basically reducing it to, why not just become Manhattan? They want a solution for today, not decades from today which is what urban planning would take. But also they likely want the neighborhood they built/moved to. They don’t want to live in a super dense mixed use plaza. They also want solutions that the plethora of communities like theirs can replicate. They just wan…

It’s less than a mile. Just build a nice bike lane / footpath.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#182

Post by KaiserPro »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #148
KaiserPro wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Long term it seems like it would be much cheaper than current last mile delivery yes, long term it might be cheaper, but to get to that long term you need to fund the huge upfront cost. Why as a consumer would you want a pipe to your door, as you are now reliant on a single company for all deliveries. if they suddenly turn shit, thats it, you're stuck with them. Its only really makes sense as a way for an uber dens…

> Why as a consumer would you want a pipe to your door, as you are now reliant on a single company for all deliveries. if they suddenly turn shit, thats it, you're stuck with them. How is this any different from phone lines, or cable, or water, or sewage, or electric? You can point out "yeah, and look at all the problems with those local-monopoly services!" but I think generally we've figured out how to provide those…

> How is this any different from phone lines,

Its not, apart from currently, there is a plurality of providers for delivery.

Obviously that doesn't exist for most utilities. In the states, that causes significant problems

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#183

Post by no_time »

cpursley wrote: post #110
pavel_lishin wrote: post #101

> The pipe is 18 inches wide — large enough to fit 40 banana Americans will use literally anything except the metric system. And bicycles, I guess.

Heck, try to get them to use their legs. We had neighbors two houses over that would always DRIVE to visit us - from their house. They thought our car was broken down whenever I walked half a mile to the grocery. America is weird.

> Heck, try to get them to use their legs.

They use their legs for measuring too for some reason.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#184

Post by bagful »

anileated wrote: post #55
ponector wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sidewalk fall into disrepair in few months? Here in my city sidewalks are keeping well intact for more than 10 years. Is theft a huge problem? Electric scooters are everywhere in the streets. Underground tunnel which is capable to fit furniture and cars will be extremely expensive. The whole idea for last mile delivery via tunnel is not economically viable.

> Here in my city sidewalks are keeping well intact for more than 10 years. They are not doing it all by themselves, especially if you live where there are seasons. If you don’t notice maintenance happening, it doesn’t mean maintenance doesn’t happen.

In the best case, sidewalk slabs tilt and settle unpredictably from frost heaves and water movement, and it only takes a small step between two slabs to trip an able person. If a sidewalk is maintained at all the lifted edges will be ground level, a yearly process. Just one example of routine maintenance that I notice.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#185

Post by keyboard_slap »

jjav wrote: post #176
keyboard_slap wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not objecting to convince in favor of density because there isn't a choice to be made between the two. You can have convenience in low or high density development. The difference is in cost and complexity; high density development has all the convenience with fewer delivery costs

> high density development has all the convenience with fewer delivery costs This seems intuitively true, but is it true? Is food delivery cheaper in Manhattan than in some sleep midwest suburb?

In some sleepy suburb you must pay for food delivery or hop in your car and drive to the restaurant. In Manhattan you could pay for delivery or skip delivery altogether and walk to one of the half-dozen (at least) restaurants on your block.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#186

Post by mkii »

Rebelgecko wrote: post #137
thorncorona wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems to work fine for singapore / dc.

I think it's hard to say things are fine when there's still huge gender disparities, in DC area it's something like 2:1

What does gender have to do with anything in this discussion?

> in DC area it's something like 2:1

That's not true.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#187

Post by conductr »

keyboard_slap wrote: post #145
conductr wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the cost of rebuilding our existing tangible cities for density? Is that without complexity? What about consideration for time? It's not as easy as hitting "new game" on Sim City

On this small scale, rebuilding would likely be more expensive than this tunnel. But extending this network to every home would be (IMO) on the same order of magnitude as redevelopment in cost, complexity, and time. Redevelopment is complicated during construction but this system is also complicated forever. Our cities are already being rebuilt piece-by-piece every day; I'd just like zoning laws to permit rebuilding…

It seems like it would always be small scale, just replicated. I don’t think they’re trying to long distance delivery through this. Like if wanted a pizza from 100 miles away, I’d not expect that to be supported.

I’m seeing it like a LAN. Which is how most of America is built. Clusters of businesses supported by surrounding area of residential. Any interconnection would likely benefit from batched movement into the node (cargo truck) then items go into this as a last mile solution.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#188

Post by conductr »

pylua wrote: post #171
conductr wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like comments like this always come up. Basically reducing it to, why not just become Manhattan? They want a solution for today, not decades from today which is what urban planning would take. But also they likely want the neighborhood they built/moved to. They don’t want to live in a super dense mixed use plaza. They also want solutions that the plethora of communities like theirs can replicate. They just wan…

Maybe I am missing something — But what problem is it really solving? They want a hamburger quicker? I personally enjoy the dichotomy between the burbs and city personally especially in Atlanta.

I don’t think quicker is necessarily the motivation. But currently they’re likely using DoorDash which requires a human and a very large automobile so I think it’s an optimization of that. It may also be quicker since it can more effectively work in parallel

It seems to me like the delivery bots you may see around some places. Except those things are pretty slow and I feel like they’re always involved in accidents with automobiles.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#189

Post by conductr »

pharmakom wrote: post #181
conductr wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like comments like this always come up. Basically reducing it to, why not just become Manhattan? They want a solution for today, not decades from today which is what urban planning would take. But also they likely want the neighborhood they built/moved to. They don’t want to live in a super dense mixed use plaza. They also want solutions that the plethora of communities like theirs can replicate. They just wan…

It’s less than a mile. Just build a nice bike lane / footpath.

I think automation is a particular motivation of this project.

Re: An underground delivery train comes to the Atlanta suburbs

#190

Post by Rebelgecko »

mkii wrote: post #186
Rebelgecko wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's hard to say things are fine when there's still huge gender disparities, in DC area it's something like 2:1

What does gender have to do with anything in this discussion? > in DC area it's something like 2:1 That's not true.

33% of bike trips in the Washington area are by women. Assuming non-binary people are around 1% of trips, that puts men at 66%, giving an exact 2:1 ratio

Source: https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/24356/dot_24356_DS1.pdf?

And IMO you can't call a mode of transportation "fine" when large swathes of the population don't feel safe or comfortable using it (this comes up a lot when I talk to female friends about bus/metro usage too)

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